I read this with tears flowing freely. I was beaten as a child. Two of the beatings were extremely severe. They were belt whippings. One of them, I was finally rescued by my sister. The other I wasn't so fortunate. I remember how much these beatings hurt physically. I remember screaming in horrific pain and begging my mother to stop. I was 8 and 10 years old. I cannot imagine how a 3/4's inch wide, heavy electrical cord would hurt.
My mother was a good mother who otherwise had psychotic rages. One thing she did right was religion. She took us to the very loving, mild and non controlling Episcopal Church. She allowed us to visit any church we wanted. She did not like Jehovah's Witnesses. She never once used God to shame, humiliate or scare us. If she had been a JW though, I imagine she might have killed one of us kids during one of her rages. I knew something was very wrong with her. I took over her care when I was in my thirties. I took her to a psychiatrist and it was detemined she had a severe rapid mood cycling disorder that would cause her mood to change erratically at least one during the day.
My dad never spanked me. He ran from the room crying the one time he was going to spank me. He just couldn't do it. Now I cannot imagine how it would have been for him to have beaten me, helped my mother and had my siblings participate and not try to save me.
No, you can't completely blame Jehovah's Witnesses for this murder/torture of this 12 year old child. But you can see how such a controlling, fear inspiring religion, that teaches of a god who sounds like a great, big, bully child abuser could inspire sick parents to do this to their children. Perhaps these parents were victims of their own abuse as children. Or maybe, like my mother, they suffered from some rage disorder. But Jehovah is a violent, murderous parent, now isn't he? What a terrible combination: sick, psycho, violent parents whose god is a sick, violent, psycho parent.
